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link and ramble
First, some links. Then, some sports ramblings. Then a random poll. Ready? Good.
Al Taubenberger is the Republican mayoral candidate in Philadelphia in this November's elections. Even for a city that might never again elect a Republican mayor, he's pathetic as a candidate. Absolutely no shot of winning. And a pathetic website to boot. (At least he has a snazzy URL.) BUT he just YouTubed the best political commercial I've ever seen. It's morning again in Philadelphia. Well, a really cheesy morning, maybe.
I never did post the 2007 Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest results, and to be honest, I haven't even read through all of them yet. But they're annually fantastic—people writing the worst possible opening sentence for a nonexistent novel. Check it out.
This dude has gotten at least one baseball at 454 straight baseball games.
NFL TV distribution maps show you which games are playing in which cities throughout the country every week. Gives you a little insight into some of the rules determining that stuff too.
Is local food really more environmentally sound? (The latter two links are from http://www.kottke.org/, which perhaps I should start reading, via Crushing Krisis, which perhaps the rest of you should start reading.)
If you give this site chapter and verse, it will give you the Bible text you specify...in about 50 different languages and translations.
I can't remember the last time I linked to Gene Weingarten's chat. But it's one of the highlights of my week, every week. He's a brilliant humorist, and in the online chat format, he's transcendent. The next one starts at noon EDT today, but be sure to take the poll first.
Now, sports rambling!
Baseball rambling: Man, the Phillies are just going to keep taunting me, aren't they? 1.5 out of the wild card, 2.5 out of the division lead, and 2.5 behind the D'Backs, who might soon fall out of their division lead and into the wild card lead. And I still don't think they'll make the playoffs; I bet they'll fall just short, like they've done something like 6 out of 7 years. I've heard the Phillies are potentially about to become the first team to miss the playoffs with 85 wins for 5 straight years, or something like that.
Anyway, my current 25 for a playoff roster: Rollins, Utley, Burrell, Howard, Rowand, Werth, Dobbs, Ruiz. Bourn, Victorino, Nunez (blah), Iguchi, Helms, Coste. Hamels, Kendrick, Lohse, Moyer. Myers, Gordon, Romero, Davis (yay for August 31th callups!), Alfonseca, Geary (if he's eligible...he might not be), Durbin. In reality Eaton will make it over Durbin or Davis or Geary, or he might even be a 12th pitcher forcing another position player to miss the cut, but that's sad to me. If Eaton and Mesa both make the playoff roster, then Manuel is an idiot.
Football rambling: Sigh. This is the most depressing 0-2 the Eagles have had in 10 years. In 2003, they lost their first two games to the 2002 and 2001 Super Bowl winners, and McNabb was hurt. In 1999, it was a clear rebuilding year; the only point of the season was to get the rookies some seasoning. You have to go back to before Andy Reid to find a time I was this depressed about the Eagles in September.
The only reason I have to think they might improve is a vague sense that offenses often don't click in the first week or two. Otherwise, the only injury that will be recovered from soon is Lito...but the defense was passable without him. (The LBs are fine, really. The CBs are okay as long as no one else gets hurt. The safetys are worrisome, and the line isn't getting a pass rush, but as long as we can keep stopping the run, I'm OK with that.) Since the defense is not the 2000 Ravens, though the offense has to pick up the slack. And the offense sucks. It's Westbrook, a limping quarterback, receivers who beyond Jason Avant look like 4 Todd Pinkstons, an overrated interior offensive line, and aging tackles. I don't really know how they can improve with this personnel, either. This really feels like a 5-11 team to me right now.
Hockey rambling: Wait...someone actually clicked this link? People still watch hockey? You must be Canadian. Or Pat.
Poll time! (By "rhyme" in the answers below, I'm referring to vowel sound only. Clearly the words don't all rhyme in the usual sense of counting the final consonant as well.)
[Poll #1057223]
(As usual, if you mess up, you can change your answers. The link to do so this time is here.)
I know you always see pronunciation surveys like this, but this is a particular class of regional pronunciation differences that I don't think is normally differentiated in those surveys. And I do think it's Philadelphia specific. More info here.
Happy Tuesday!
Al Taubenberger is the Republican mayoral candidate in Philadelphia in this November's elections. Even for a city that might never again elect a Republican mayor, he's pathetic as a candidate. Absolutely no shot of winning. And a pathetic website to boot. (At least he has a snazzy URL.) BUT he just YouTubed the best political commercial I've ever seen. It's morning again in Philadelphia. Well, a really cheesy morning, maybe.
I never did post the 2007 Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest results, and to be honest, I haven't even read through all of them yet. But they're annually fantastic—people writing the worst possible opening sentence for a nonexistent novel. Check it out.
This dude has gotten at least one baseball at 454 straight baseball games.
NFL TV distribution maps show you which games are playing in which cities throughout the country every week. Gives you a little insight into some of the rules determining that stuff too.
Is local food really more environmentally sound? (The latter two links are from http://www.kottke.org/, which perhaps I should start reading, via Crushing Krisis, which perhaps the rest of you should start reading.)
If you give this site chapter and verse, it will give you the Bible text you specify...in about 50 different languages and translations.
I can't remember the last time I linked to Gene Weingarten's chat. But it's one of the highlights of my week, every week. He's a brilliant humorist, and in the online chat format, he's transcendent. The next one starts at noon EDT today, but be sure to take the poll first.
Now, sports rambling!
Baseball rambling: Man, the Phillies are just going to keep taunting me, aren't they? 1.5 out of the wild card, 2.5 out of the division lead, and 2.5 behind the D'Backs, who might soon fall out of their division lead and into the wild card lead. And I still don't think they'll make the playoffs; I bet they'll fall just short, like they've done something like 6 out of 7 years. I've heard the Phillies are potentially about to become the first team to miss the playoffs with 85 wins for 5 straight years, or something like that.
Anyway, my current 25 for a playoff roster: Rollins, Utley, Burrell, Howard, Rowand, Werth, Dobbs, Ruiz. Bourn, Victorino, Nunez (blah), Iguchi, Helms, Coste. Hamels, Kendrick, Lohse, Moyer. Myers, Gordon, Romero, Davis (yay for August 31th callups!), Alfonseca, Geary (if he's eligible...he might not be), Durbin. In reality Eaton will make it over Durbin or Davis or Geary, or he might even be a 12th pitcher forcing another position player to miss the cut, but that's sad to me. If Eaton and Mesa both make the playoff roster, then Manuel is an idiot.
Football rambling: Sigh. This is the most depressing 0-2 the Eagles have had in 10 years. In 2003, they lost their first two games to the 2002 and 2001 Super Bowl winners, and McNabb was hurt. In 1999, it was a clear rebuilding year; the only point of the season was to get the rookies some seasoning. You have to go back to before Andy Reid to find a time I was this depressed about the Eagles in September.
The only reason I have to think they might improve is a vague sense that offenses often don't click in the first week or two. Otherwise, the only injury that will be recovered from soon is Lito...but the defense was passable without him. (The LBs are fine, really. The CBs are okay as long as no one else gets hurt. The safetys are worrisome, and the line isn't getting a pass rush, but as long as we can keep stopping the run, I'm OK with that.) Since the defense is not the 2000 Ravens, though the offense has to pick up the slack. And the offense sucks. It's Westbrook, a limping quarterback, receivers who beyond Jason Avant look like 4 Todd Pinkstons, an overrated interior offensive line, and aging tackles. I don't really know how they can improve with this personnel, either. This really feels like a 5-11 team to me right now.
Hockey rambling: Wait...someone actually clicked this link? People still watch hockey? You must be Canadian. Or Pat.
Poll time! (By "rhyme" in the answers below, I'm referring to vowel sound only. Clearly the words don't all rhyme in the usual sense of counting the final consonant as well.)
[Poll #1057223]
(As usual, if you mess up, you can change your answers. The link to do so this time is here.)
I know you always see pronunciation surveys like this, but this is a particular class of regional pronunciation differences that I don't think is normally differentiated in those surveys. And I do think it's Philadelphia specific. More info here.
Happy Tuesday!
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http://www.ethicurean.com/2007/08/10/shuman-on-lamb/
http://www.alternet.org/environment/60670/
I have little sympathy for environmentalists agonizing over which kind of lamb to eat, though. maybe try some lentils instead? or at least a backyard chicken or something.
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But, yes, lamb as an example definitely gave me a laugh.
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man, mad, pass, cab (are all more nasal than...)
trap, swam (although pass and swam can go in either group, I put them where I tend to say them. I also think that trap is the least nasal of all of these, but swam ends with a nasal /m/ which influences the vowel)
I grew up in a NJ suburb of NY and as an adult lived in DC.
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mad, pass, cab,and trap rhyme
and swam and man also rhyme.
Maybe you should have majored in linguistics!
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And regarding Bible cross-referencing, I recommend BibleGateway, specifically this feature. You can change which translations you want to see, of course.
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trap = swam
New York City.
(perhaps diluted by Upstate and Maryland)
bwahahaha
(Anonymous) 2007-09-20 01:50 pm (UTC)(link)RANGERS IN 08!
Meanwhile, I can't believe your football team has the same record as mine.
It would be kinda amusing to see the phils make the playoffs, robbing the mets of the division title, just because I got so much shit from the mets fans at the beginning of the year.
good to know there are some sports fans out there in the hevre.
--Ruby K